What Is This All For?
12 Even now— this is the Lord’s declaration— turn to me with all your heart, with fasting, weeping, and mourning.
13 Tear your hearts, not just your clothes, and return to the Lord your God. For he is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger, abounding in faithful love, and he relents from sending disaster.
14 Who knows? He may turn and relent and leave a blessing behind him, so you can offer a grain offering and a drink offering to the Lord your God.
15 Blow the trumpet in Zion! Announce a sacred fast; proclaim a solemn assembly.
16 Gather the people; sanctify the congregation; assemble the aged; gather the infants, even babies nursing at the breast. Let the groom leave his bedroom, and the bride her honeymoon chamber.
17 Let the priests, the Lord’s ministers, weep between the portico and the altar. Let them say, “Have pity on your people, Lord, and do not make your inheritance a disgrace, an object of scorn among the nations. Why should it be said among the peoples, ‘Where is their God?'”
18 Then the Lord became jealous for his land and spared his people.
19 The Lord answered his people: Look, I am about to send you grain, new wine, and fresh oil. You will be satiated with them, and I will no longer make you a disgrace among the nations.
Joel 2:12–19 [CSB]
What are the ashes drawn in the shape of the cross on our foreheads for?
To bring out that mark God already has made on you.
When He baptized you into His name…into His Son…on the Cross where He punished Jesus instead of destroying you…
Like He destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah. Like He did other nations. Like He did Israel. Like He will the whole world.
Why? Because we deserve to be!
Disaster is right on our doorsteps! You think not?
People are sneering…fists raised…yes, they are saying they can do what they want…they are defying God.
Hear them? Listen to what is really being said: “Ha!
We can do what we like.
Watch and see!
And we will do it again!
So where…where… is your God when I do it to His face?
Where is He who calls all that we like to do…all what I want to do…evil…?
Where is He to punish what He calls sin?”
God says, “From dust you were taken and to dust you will return…”
No one escapes death. No one. God will not be mocked. He says that, “The wages of sin is death.”
That is what God told Adam because of his and his wife’s sin.
Yes, and to dust the world will be reduced to also…
…soon now…maybe here in America sooner than Africa. I don’t know.
But remember, Nineveh repented. God spared them for several generations—over 200 years I think it was.
Pray America… pray Illinois… and Lombard… repents also… repents—before it is too late.
Yes, because…
12 “even now,” declares the Lord, “return to me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning; 13 and rend your hearts and not your garments.” Return to the Lord your God, for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love; and he relents over disaster. 14 Who knows whether he will not turn and relent, and leave a blessing behind him, a grain offering and a drink offering for the Lord your God?
Even so, still….all returns to dust. But only those with the sign of the cross on them will be raised to newness of life.
Only those who return to the Lord will be saved…those who return to the place where that mark was made.
This is what Lent is for. To mark us again for our burial. Yes, as we know what the consequences of sin are. Death.
Yes, from dust we too were taken and will return…
But with that mark…made with water… and Word…we won’t stay there.
15 Blow the trumpet in Zion; consecrate a fast; call a solemn assembly; 16 gather the people. Consecrate the congregation; assemble the elders; gather the children, even nursing infants. Let the bridegroom leave his room, and the bride her chamber.
We have…we are…it is called Lent.
It is called the application of ashes…consecrating you again for burial…with Christ…in that living and ever flowing Water…the very waters of life…
So that we will be spared eternal destruction…flames and ash…
To be instead raised to eternal life. Take the ash now…death now…so that life eternal is ours later.
Yes, Lent is preparation for our death now, but only for Easter later—our very own Easter. Easter…our Easter, is only possible with the Cross…with Jesus’ death…and our death in Him…in Water…in Word…in this life…in this world…with its ways….
Lent is a time to fast and pray. To die to self. To die to sin. To switch our focus. To remove things in our lives that distract and blind us from the truth…for that which brings death and destruction….
Yes, to focus on dying…to let our sin nature die again…to drown it…that those things of sin to be removed…cleared away…cleaned off…the things that entrap us again in this world…in sin…that bring God’s wrath and doom…fire and ash….
…let them go…walk away…let them die…to be replaced with life…that new life to come…that He even gives a start of this here and now…a down payment from His Easter for the Easter to come…
Yes, because then it does…
Don’t you know, Easter already has come? Then for sure, it is to be ours next! So…yes, lets get ready…
17 Between the vestibule and the altar let the priests, the ministers of the Lord, weep and say, “Spare your people, O Lord, and make not your heritage a reproach, a byword among the nations. Why should they say among the peoples, ‘Where is their God?'”
We can answer this…we can answer them—answer and say that it is not yet too late…even for them:
Tell them that: He is here…in His Word…which endures forever…in the Living Water that marked us forever to be His…and in His Supper where He meets with us…feeds us…helps us to live in this world that is going to be in flames soon…a heap of ash all too soon…
And then Easter. Easter is so near. Ours…and yes the Earth’s too. It too is waiting…it too will also be reborn out of those ashes…just as we will be, it will be free of sin’s decay…no longer filled with death…
All new and green…alive…really alive…as it was meant to be…forever.
Yes, He has called us. We have come. He has marked us. We have cried out and we will do so until the end—call to Him. We will look to Him. We have turned to Him for mercy. We mourn and cry out:
“Spare your people, O Lord…!”
And what does He do? How does He answer?
He has already…He has acted…has answered. Jesus came and died…Jesus rose again…Jesus came to us—to you in water and word…and does in bread and wine.
He has marked us for death so that we can live.
Yes, He responds…He answers because….
18 Then the Lord became jealous for his land and had pity on his people. 19 The Lord answered and said to his people, “Behold, I am sending to you grain, wine, and oil, and you will be satisfied…
All of this has started already to come to us…in Word and Sacrament….because of Easter…
We are being filled up…with Him….today even…because of Easter…
…and then we will see—the world and the devil will see. Easter is almost here.
God says, “…I will no more make you a reproach among the nations.”
This…
All because Easter has already come.
Ours is next.
Morning is about to dawn. He is coming…in the fire of His Glory…
He will rise upon the earth—death dying in that intense… on His light.
Then it is up and out…for all those marked by sign…in His name…as all is burned into ash….
…and then glory…and then the Easter morning…the forever Son forever…our Emmauel with us… aways, world without end. Amen.
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